Lions 2017 [MOD WARNING IN OP]

pickarooney wrote: »

Daly, Ha'porth, Williams all played this week I guess so Hogg has to start at 15? Maybe Seymour too, I can't remember which wingers are available.

I'd say a possible back three of Hogg, Seymour and Watson. I reckon Te'o will be at 12, 13 may be between Payne and Joseph, Payne needs the gametime.

Half back is less clear. Sexton, Farrell and Biggar all played last week. I can't see Farrell playing in this one given he also played in the Champions Cup final, so either Sexton or Biggar. Sexton doesn't have much gametime and the Lions will want him to find form quickly. Scrum half may depend on Webb's fitness. Laidlaw may get the start.

Possible backline

15 Stuart Hogg
14 Anthony Watson
13 Jared Payne
12 Ben Te'o
11 Tommy Seymour
10 Jonathan Sexton
9 Greg Laidlaw

Marler, Best and Sinclair have had a couple of weeks off so should make the front row. I expect Henderson to start alongside maybe Alun Wyn who had a period out before the semi final. The other second rows have had a fairly heavy workload lately. Faletau will probably start at 8 alongside Warburton. I assume the management will be keen to get SOB on the pitch asap and given the 3 potential test Blindsides all played at the weekend I guess we could see Warburton at 6 and O'Brien at 7. The other possibility may be to stick Moriarty at 6. I have no idea if he can play there, but most No.8s can generally do a job there.

Possible pack

1 Joe Marler
2 Rory Best
3 Kyle Sinclair
4 Iain Henderson
5 Alun Wyn Jones
6 Ross Moriarty/Sam Warburton
7 Sam Warburton/Sean O'Brien
8 Toby Faletau

But that is based on who has played a lot recently and who hasn't. Gatland and co may take a completely different strategy to their selection meeting.

Why would Saracens players be rested?

Also, Lawes was playing this weekend for Northampton.

I'd expect guys like AWJ and possibly SOB to play next week. They're guys who have a chance of being involved in the first test and also don't have much game time of late.

Webb is grand. He'll start I would think.

I'd also put the house on Warburton starting. .

I'll have a guess at McGrath, George, Sinkler, AWJ, Kruis, SOB/Itoje, Warburton, Faletau, Webb, Biggar, Watson, Henshaw, Joseph, North, Hogg.

I think they'll be eager to get Payne involved but they'll want to keep something in reserve for the Blues game to get their defence right.

Buer wrote: »

Why would Saracens players be rested?

Also, Lawes was playing this weekend for Northampton.

I'd expect guys like AWJ and possibly SOB to play next week. They're guys who have a chance of being involved in the first test and also don't have much game time of late.

Webb is grand. He'll start I would think.

I'd also put the house on Warburton starting. .

My thinking is that Saracens players played a Champions Cup final and a league semi final in successive weeks, so yes they had this weekend off but they have still had a lot of high intensity rugby recently. It was a major factor in their defeat to the Chiefs.

https://twitter.com/maroitoje/status/869159795932012548

An extra large lion for an extra large chungfla

irishbucsfan wrote: »

https://twitter.com/maroitoje/status/869159795932012548

An extra large lion for an extra large chungfla

I'd say he's happy it's big, harder to nick and I'd say there's a fairly big fine for losing it

Buer wrote: »

Of all the people on that tour, Haskell is gonna whip that the second his back is turned.

And I'd imagine Itoje could then beat the living piss out of Haskell, right in front of the entire squad of players and coaches, and there wouldn't be a single witness statement outside of, "he fell".

thomond2006 wrote: »

A good read on everything that went wrong in 2005: http://www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/40069682

Good old Woodward. Still unwilling to take any of the responsibility.

It omits my favourite Lions 2005 story. The coaching staff became completely paranoid the week of the first test that NZ were spying on their training sessions and had stolen their line out calls.

They changed all of the calls about 5 days before the first test. Nobody knew the calls properly and the Lions got absolutely cleaned out at the set piece. They had spent 5 weeks learning the calls up to that point.

Lunacy.

Buer wrote: »

There was another article that the Telegraph did which pieced together a rake of interviews with players and Andy Robinson. It's car crash stuff. They all come pretty clean about how disjointed things were.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/93084647/lions-tour-the-inside-story-of-the-blackwash-the-worst-lions-tour-ever

They're very complimentary about the NZ team but you get the impression that the test squad (those 23-25 players) were totally miserable.

They might be praising Campbell but they also brush over the PR rubbish. Refusing to let Geordie Murphy say he went for a beer to clear his head after a game in his published tour diary. They made him publish that he went for a walk.

Or after it was clear Henson wasn't to be involved in the opening test, they staged a PR photograph (without the knowledge of Henson) of himself and Woodward having a pleasant chat leaving training to make it look like all was well.

Woodward completely lost the run of himself on the tour.

You've probably all heard this recently as well, but apparently O'Driscoll and Hickie only trained once together during the whole tour.

CatFromHue wrote: »

if exact same thing happened to umaga by two of the lions how do you think kiwi's would have reacted?

They would have bitched and moaned and bitched and moaned and bitched and moaned. They would have questioned why they're involved in Lions tours. They would have brought it up for a few years afterwards.

And Lions fans would have completely downplayed it and accused the kiwis of being bitchers and moaners and being soft. Just like anyone else really.

Everyone would take that blatant act of thuggish play the same way. There's always a large element of fans blindly defending their national team.

Jeez, don't be a sook.

thomond2006 wrote: »

If Hayes had started the tests, 3-0 Lions was guaranteed.

The Lions never lost a game that Hayes played in for them